In Memory of Me
Young people talk about the Eucharist - the Blessed Sacrament which Jesus gave to us at the Last Supper, telling his disciples to 'Do this in memory of me.'
As the Catholic Church professes, "the mode of Christ's presence under the Eucharistic species is unique. It raises the Eucharist above all the sacraments as "the perfection of the spiritual life and the end to which all the sacraments tend." In the most blessed sacrament of the Eucharist "the body and blood, together with the soul and divinity, of our Lord Jesus Christ and, therefore, the whole Christ is truly, really, and substantially contained." (CC1374) It is "a sacrament of love, a sign of unity, a bond of charity, a Paschal banquet 'in which Christ is consumed, the mind is filled with grace, and a pledge of future glory is given to us.'" (CC 1323)
With many thanks to Father Stan Fortuna CFR for the gift of his music.
You can subscribe to this podcast / download the free mp3s here on itunes or here from Totus2us's feed. Plus, you can download individual mp3 recordings by right clicking where you see this diamond ♦
and you can listen to Blessed John Paul II's beautiful encyclical on the Eucharist here.
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with Paschal ♦
Paschal, who's 22 & from London:
"Pope Benedict said the Eucharist is the proof of God's love. Bishop Fulton J. Sheen said that when you really love somebody you might write them a letter or better than that you might speak to them on the phone, but love's deepest desire is for union and, in the Eucharist, there is partly our desire to be with God but more than that it's God's passionate desire to be with us. It's the proof of his love."
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with Roger ♦
Roger, from America:
"When I was around 30, speaking to a nun in a bookstore, she told me about the Catholic belief of Jesus, true body, blood, soul and divinity in the Blessed Sacrament and that this was the Church he founded, and so that was enough for me, after all I'd been through, and I came in immediately to the Church after that. To this day I still make a Holy Hour every week and the Eucharist is really everything for me: it's God reaching out to us with his infinite love at all times."
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with Anton, Armel Paul Mary & Alastair ♦
Anton, 24 & from England: "I find that in receiving the Eucharist, in receiving God and Him becoming closer and more of a not just physical part but a real spiritual part of the body, it helps with the day, it gives order and peace to the day."
Armel, 28 & from the Ivory Coast: "The only prayer when I feel I'm not forcing myself towards God but God comes to me is the Eucharist and it's the prayer when you don't need any effort to meet God. I can't afford to miss Mass on a day and it's real food for me."
Alastair, from Britain: "Every week for me the highlight is the invitation to go to Mass and I find that however I feel, whether I'm in a positive or a negative mood, I come to Mass and listen to the service and the readings and go to receive communion in the Eucharist and I come away from that filled and fed, and if I'm in a positive mood I feel really inspired, if I'm in not such a positive mood I find that all my troubles or fears will for a little while after I receive communion, I've accepted the invitation that Christ has given me, I've come to Mass, I've received Him in the Eucharist and been fed by His body and blood, that everything else is not as important, everything is put in perspective and clarity."
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with Erin ♦
Erin, 1 of the Totus2us team, 28 & from America: "When I approach to receive the body of Our Lord, what I always remember is St Thérèse calling this moment the kiss of love from Jesus and I remember attending midnight Mass on Christmas Eve once at a Cistercian monastery and hearing the priest there proclaim "This is the feast of Love." I remember this priest speaking about how God is Love, and what does love do? Love wants oneness with us so Love becomes one of us. The great infinite God becomes a baby, small enough so that we can hold him in our arms, and the Lord of the universe, yes, He wants to be hidden beneath a piece of bread, something we can be fed by, something we will consume and be nourished by and take into ourselves. So this is what the Eucharist is for me: a very gradual unfolding of this mystery that God is Love. It's a gateway into the heavenly communion that I am invited to."
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with Richard & Peter ♦
Richard, 25 & a seminarian from the UK: "The Eucharist is the supreme presence of Christ in the universe, really; just an awesome thing to receive Our Lord who becomes one of us. At Mass we are conscious that every part of Christ's life - his annunciation, his birth, his public ministry, the resurrection, the ascension - are all present in the Holy Eucharist. When we receive Him, the graces that flow are potentially sublime."
Peter, 25 & a seminarian from the UK: "When I think of the Eucharist my heart just overflows with thanksgiving. Here in our midst, for all time, Jesus Christ is truly present to us. As present as he was to the apostles, to the people he heale,d and I am just so grateful that, whatever happens in my life, however well or however badly things go, I have the joy and the peace of knowing that I will be able to go and kneel before Him in the Blessed Sacrament, and whether I feel anything, whether I experience profound conversion, or whether I don't, in that simple act of kneeling there in the Church, I can know by faith that Jesus Christ is as near to me as He can be in this life."
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with Philip ♦
Philip, 25 & a seminarian from the UK: "For me, home is where your heart is and the Eucharist is my home. When I discerned my vocation to go to seminary, daily Mass was so important and eventually I found a church offering exposition of the Blessed Sacrament all afternoon. It felt natural to be there. I could just tell Jesus everything and sit in silence and let His presence fill me with peace. He's now my best friend and this makes Him the source of my greatest joys and frustrations. I find trying to understand him is more difficult than my philosophy class and at others I just know a peace that the world can't give. He's now at my centre. Going to Him there is no longer an option, it's my life. Whether joyful or frustrated, I wouldn't want to be anywhere else. He's my home."
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with Helen, Adrian & Joel ♦
Helen, 20 & from England: "The Eucharist is a really important part of my life, and I get great joy and encouragement from spending time in front of the Blessed Sacrament. And for me Jesus is just incredibly present there and it's an amazing way to spend time with God. I don't find I need to say anything or do anything, I can just sit and spend time with God, a;nd that really refreshes me and builds me up. It's an amazing gift to have in the Church."
Adrian, 22 & from England: "When I am sitting there with Jesus in adoration and he is present in the Eucharist, it is really an encounter with a real person.. And it's not just any person but with Him, with Jesus who is love itself .. Jesus is really present in the here and now, in the Eucharist, he is there and he is asking me to be as fully present as I can be in that moment with him. That has helped me in my day to day life to try to be present in each moment and know that Jesus is present in all the other moments of my life."
Joel, 21 & from England: "I find that going to Mass and receiving the Eucharist is probably the clearest expression I have in my life of God's love and the way that He works. I'm a student .. I can take time out and come to Mass and spend some quiet time with God, know the reality of His presence in my life. It's something concrete, it's something that's not ever going to go away. I find that a tremendously inspiring experience and it's something I don't think I could ever live without really."
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with Caecilia ♦
Caecilia, who's 22 & from Germany: "The Eucharist gives me strength for my life and the Holy Mass is the biggest gift in my life, because Jesus is really present in the Eucharist, and you can bring in the Eucharist all the things that have happened in your life, all that you have in your heart, and it's a very nice relationship with Jesus because He is really present. I learned to love the Church so much at the World Youth Day in 2000. I learned to see the fullness from the Church and the joy from the Church ..
On the World Youth Day I understood Jesus is really present in the Eucharist."
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with Robert Francis & Shannon ♦
Robert Francis, 25 & from England: "For me the Eucharist is something extremely precious to everyone as we all are able to give something to God, even though it isn't needed, in the form of our prayers and the eucharistic prayer as a community. Then on receiving the Eucharist the gift of grace that it fills us, whether we are praying for an intention of our own or for someone that we love."
Shannon, 19 & from England: "For me spending time in front of Christ, the real presence of Christ, is a time for reflection and it doesn't matter where you are in your journey towards heaven, or where you are at any point in your life, Christ is always there and He remains the same and He is constant. And it's refreshing to come back and have that check-point with Him and just reaffirm what it is He has got in store for you. And to be in the presence and feel that complete love is awesome and it's an awesome gift to have."
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with Joe & Nadia ♦
Joe, 20 & from England: "For a long time I struggled to understand how the Eucharist could be Christ, but one evening in adoration I just let the Lord guide me to a passage in the Bible and it was John 6, the discourse on the Eucharist, where I read 'This is my flesh.' I then looked up at the Eucharist in adoration and I saw the face of Christ for a second at the monstrance, and I knew ... I knew I was in the presence of God."
Nadia, from Trinidad: "To me the Eucharist is the source of all that is good about our faith. It's the actual presence of Jesus. It's what distinguishes my faith from other Christian faiths, where I have Jesus in this most powerful way - ministering to me, loving me, being there for me, being in conversation with me, almost sometimes even a physical experience of closeness to him, and even healing, complete and utter healing where I can open up my heart to him about anything. Things that I hide maybe from other people or from the world, I can't hide from Jesus and He just sort of gets into that place deep within my heart, deep within my being, and He restores and He revives and He consoles and He loves me; I feel his tremendous presence, his tremendous love."
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with Emily, Will & Pippa ♦
Emily, 20 & from England: "The Eucharist is so important to me because I believe that it is the most intimate gift that God has given us."
Will, 18 & from England: "I have a real passion for the Eucharist because it really is Jesus and sometimes when I just sit in adoration before Him I am just filled with such wonder and awe."
Pippa, 20 & from England: "The Eucharist for me is everything .. The words in the Mass, 'Lord I am not worthy to receive you' I feel so strongly every time I say them. I feel so human and so unworthy to receive something so beautiful, but as soon as I go up to receive Him, all of those doubts and fears are completely wiped away and the Lord reassures me that this is a gift that He is sharing with His children and He loves us so much."